CAPUT II.

I. Concerning things done in Illumination.

We have, then, reverently affirmed that this is the purpose of our Hierarchy,
viz., our assimilation and union with God, as far as attainable. And, as the Divine
Oracles teach, we shall attain this only by the love and the religious performance
of the most worshipful Commandments. For He says: “He229229John xiv. 23.
that loveth Me will keep My Word, and My Father will love him, and we will come
unto him, and will make Our abode with him.” What, then, is source of the religious
performance of the most august commandments? Our preparation for the restitution
of the supercelestial rest, which forms the habits of our souls into an aptitude
for the reception of the other sacred sayings and doings230230Ibid. i. 13.,
the transmission of our holy and most divine regeneration231231Ibid. iii. 5..
For, as our illustrious Leader used
75to say, the very first movement of the mind towards Divine things is the willing reception
of Almighty God, but the very earliest step of the religious reception towards the
religious performance of the Divine commandments is the unutterable operation of
our being from God. For if our232232See Baptismal Offices. being from God is the
Divine engendering, never would he know, and certainly never perform, any of the
Divine instructions, who had not had his beginning to be in God. To speak after
the manner of men, must we not first begin to be, and then to do, our affairs? Since
he, who does not exist at all, has neither movement nor even beginning; since he,
who in some way exists, alone does, or suffers, those things suitable to his own
nature. This, then, as I think, is clear. Let us next contemplate the Divine symbols
of the birth in God. And I pray, let no uninitiated person approach the sight233233C. 2. s. 62.; for neither is it without danger to gaze upon the
glorious rays of the sun with weak eyes, nor is it without peril to put our hand
to things above us. For right was the priesthood of the Law, when rejecting Osias,
because he put his hand to sacred things; and Korah, because to things sacred above
his capacity; and Nadab and Abihu, because they treated things, within their own
province, unholily.
76

II. Mysterion of Illumination.

Section I.

The Hierarch, then, wishing that all men whatsoever should be saved by their
assimilation towards God, and come to recognition of truth, proclaims to all the
veritable Good News, that God being compassionate towards those upon earth, out
of His own proper and innate goodness, deigned Himself to come to us with outstretched
arms, by reason of loving-kindness towards men; and, by the union with Him, to assimilate,
like as by fire, things that have been made one, in proportion to their aptitude
for deification. “For as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become children
of God—to those who believe on His Name, who were begotten, not of bloods, nor
of will of flesh, but of God234234Coptic Con. II. 40; Ap. C. lib. viii. c. 38..”

Section II.

He, who has felt a religious longing to participate in these truly supermundane
gifts, comes to some one of the initiated, and persuades him to act as his conductor
to the Hierarch. He then professes wholly to follow the teaching that shall be given
to him, and prays him to undertake the superintendence of his introduction, and
of all his after life. Now he, though religiously longing for his salvation, when
he measures human infirmity against the loftiness of the undertaking, is suddenly
seized
77with a shivering and sense of incapacity,
nevertheless, at last, he agrees, with a good grace, to do what is requested, and
takes and leads him to the chief Hierarch.

Section III.

He, then, when with joy he has received, as the sheep upon his shoulders, the
two men, and has first worshipped, glorifies with a mental thanksgiving and bodily
prostration the One beneficent Source, from Which, those who are being called, are
called, and those who are being saved, are saved.

Section IV.

Then collecting a full religious assembly into the sacred place, for co-operation,
and common rejoicing over the man’s salvation, and for thanksgiving for the Divine
Goodness, he first chants a certain hymn, found in the Oracles, accompanied by the
whole body of the Church; and after this, when he has kissed the holy table, he
advances to the man before him, and demands of him, what has brought him here?

Section V.

When the man, out of love to God, has confessed, according to the instruction
of his sponsor, his ungodliness, his ignorance of the really beautiful, his insufficiency
for the life in God, and prays, through his holy mediation, to attain to God and
Divine things, he (the Hierarch) testifies to him, that his approach ought to be
entire, as to God Who is All Perfect, and without
78 blemish; and when he has expounded to
him fully the godly course of life, and has demanded of him, if he would thus live,—after
his promise he places his right hand upon his head, and when he has sealed him,
commands the priests to register the man and his sponsor.

Section VI.

When these have enrolled the names, he makes a holy prayer, and when the whole
Church have completed this with him, he looses his sandals, and removes his clothing,
through the Leitourgoi. Then, when he has placed him facing the west and beating
his hands, averted towards the same quarter, he commands him thrice to breathe scorn
upon Satan, and further, to profess the words of the renunciation. When he has witnessed
his threefold renunciation, he turns him back to the east, after he has professed
this thrice; and when he has looked up to heaven, and extended his hands thitherward,
he commands him to be enrolled under Christ, and all the Divinely transmitted Oracles
of God. When the man has done this, he attests again for him his threefold profession,
and again, when he has thrice professed, after prayer, he gives thanks, and lays
his hand upon him.

Section VII.

When the Deacons have entirely unclothed him, the Priests bring the holy oil
of the anointing. Then he begins the anointing, through the threefold sealing, and
for the rest assigns the man to the Priests, for the anointing of his whole body,
while himself
79advances to the mother of filial adoption,
and when he has purified the water within it by the holy invocations, and perfected
it by three cruciform effusions of the altogether most pure Muron235235μύπος
is the unguent prepared from myrrh, μυποθεγγὴς
is shining with such unguent, and μυροσταγὴς
(μυπος and σταζω)
dripping with ditto. Ap. Con. lib. ii. c. 14., and by the same number of injections of the all holy Muron, and
has invoked the sacred melody of the inspiration of the God-rapt Prophets, he orders
the man to be brought forward; and when one of the Priests, from the register, has
announced him236236Syr. Doc. p. 60. Clark. and his surety, he is conducted by
the Priests near the water to the hand of the Hierarch, being led by the hand to
him. Then the Hierarch, standing above, when the Priests have again called aloud
near the Hierarch within the water the name of the initiated, the Hierarch dips
him three times, invoking the threefold Subsistence of the Divine Blessedness, at
the three immersions and emersions of the initiated. The Priests then take him,
and entrust him to the Sponsor and guide of his introduction; and when they, in
conjunction with him, have cast over the initiated appropriate clothing, they lead
him again to the Hierarch, who, when he has sealed the man with the most Divinely
operating Muron, pronounces him to be henceforward partaker of the most Divinely
initiating Eucharist.
80

Section VIII.

When he has finished these things, he elevates himself from his progression to
things secondary, to the contemplation of things237237From outward signs to inward grace.
first, as one, who, at no time or manner, turns himself to any other thing whatever
than those which are peculiarly his own, but from things Divine to Divine,—is
persistently and always ranging himself under the banner of the supremely Divine
Spirit.

III. Contemplation.

Section I.

This initiation, then, of the holy birth in God, as in symbols, has nothing unbecoming
or irreverent, nor anything of the sensible images, but (contains) enigmas of a
contemplation worthy of God, likened to physical and human images. For how should
it appear misleading? Even when the very divine meaning of the things done is passed
over in silence,238238Catechism. the divine Instruction might convince,
religiously pursuing as it does the good life of the candidate, enjoining upon him
the purification from every kind of evil, through a virtuous and Divine life, by
the physical cleansing through the agency of water in a bodily form. This symbolic
teaching then of the things done, even if it had nothing more divine, would not
be without religious value, as I think, introducing a discipline of a well-regulated
life, and. suggesting mysteriously, through the total bodily
81purification by water, the complete purification from the evil life.

Section II.

Let this, then, be, for the uninitiated, a conducting guidance of the soul, which
separates, as is meet things sacred and uniform from multiplicity, and apportions
the harmonious elevation to the Orders severally in turn. But we, who have ascended
by sacred gradations to the sources of the things performed, and have been religiously
taught these (sources), shall recognize of what moulds they are the reliefs, and
of what invisible things they are the likenesses. For, as is distinctly shewn in
the Treatise concerning “Intelligible and Sensible,” sacred things in sensible forms
are copies of things intelligible, to which they lead and shew the way; and things
intelligible are source and science of things hierarchical cognizable by the senses.

Section III.

Let us affirm, then, that the goodness of the Divine Blessedness is always in
the same condition and manner, unfolding the beneficent rays of its own light upon
all the intellectual visions without grudging. Should, then, the self-choosing self-sufficiency
of the contemplators either turn away from the light contemplated, by closing, through
love of evil, the faculties for enlightenment naturally implanted within it, it
would be separated from the light present to
82 it, not turned away, but shining upon
it when shortsighted and turning its face from light generously running to it; or
should it overstep the bounds of the visible given to it in due proportion, and
rashly undertake to gaze upon the rays superior to its vision, the light indeed
will do nothing beyond its proper functions, but it, by imperfectly approaching
thing’s perfect, would not attain to things unsuitable, and, by stupidly disregarding
the due proportion, would fail through its own fault.

But, as I said, the Divine Light is always unfolded beneficently to the intellectual
visions, and it is possible for them to seize it when present, and always being
most ready for the distribution of things appropriate, in a manner becoming God.
To this imitation the divine Hierarch is fashioned, unfolding to all, without grudging,
the luminous rays of his inspired teaching, and, after the Divine example, being
most ready to enlighten the proselyte, neither using a grudging nor an unholy wrath
for former back-slidings or excess, but, after the example of God, always enlightening
by his conducting light those who approach him, as becomes a Hierarch, in fitness,
and order, and in proportion to the aptitude of each for holy things.

Section IV.

But, inasmuch as the Divine Being is source of sacred order, within which the
holy Minds regulate themselves, he, who recurs to the proper view of
83 Nature, will see his proper self in what
he was originally, and will acquire this, as the first holy gift, from his recovery
to the light. Now he, who has well looked upon his own proper condition with unbiassed
eyes, will depart from the gloomy recesses of ignorance, but being imperfect he
will not, of his own accord, at once desire the most perfect union and participation
of God, but little by little will be carried orderly and reverently through things
present to things more forward, and through these to things foremost, and when perfected,
to the supremely Divine summit. An illustration of this decorous and sacred order
is the modesty of the proselyte, and his prudence in his own affairs in having the
sponsor as leader of the way to the Hierarch. The Divine Blessedness receives the
man, thus conducted, into communion with Itself, and imparts to him the proper light
as a kind of sign, making him godly and sharer of the inheritance of the godly,
and sacred ordering; of which things the Hierarch’s seal, given to the proselyte,
and the saving enrolment of the priests are a sacred symbol, registering him amongst
those who are being saved, and placing in the sacred memorials, beside himself also
his sponsor,—the one indeed, as a true lover of the life-giving way to truth
and a companion of a godly guide, and the other, as an unerring conductor of his
follower by the Divinely-taught directions.
84

Section V.

Yet it is not possible to hold, conjointly, qualities thoroughly opposed, nor
that a man who has had a certain fellowship with the One should have divided lives,
if he clings to the firm participation in the One; but he must be resistless and
resolute, as regards all separations from the uniform. This it is which the teaching
of the symbols reverently and enigmatically intimates, by stripping the proselyte,
as it were, of his former life, and discarding to the very utmost the habits within
that life, makes him stand naked and barefoot, looking away towards the west, whilst
he spurns, by the aversion of his hands, the participations in the gloomy baseness,
and breathes out, as it were, the habit of dissimilarity which he had acquired,
and professes the entire renunciation of everything contrary to the Divine likeness.
When the man has thus become invincible and separate from evil, it turns him towards
the east, declaring clearly that his position and recovery will be purely in the
Divine Light, in the complete separation from baseness; and receiving his sacred
promises of entire consort with the One, since he has become uniform through love
of the truth. Yet it is pretty evident, as I think, to those versed in Hierarchical
matters, that things intellectual acquire the unchangeableness of the Godlike habit,
by continuous and persistent struggles towards one, and by the entire destruction
and annihilation of
85 things contrary. For it is necessary
that a man should not only depart from every kind of baseness, but he must be also
bravely obdurate and ever fearless against the baneful submission to it. Nor must
he, at any time, become remiss in his sacred love of the truth, but with all his
power persistently and perpetually be elevated towards it, always religiously pursuing
his upward course, to the more perfect mysteries of the Godhead.

Section VI.

Now you may see the distinct illustrations of these things in the religious rites
performed by the Hierarch. For the Godlike Hierarch starts with the holy anointing,
and the Priests under him complete the Divine service of the Chrism, summoning in
type the man initiated to the holy contests, within which he is placed under Christ
as Umpire: since, as God, He is Institutor of the awards of contest, and as wise,
He placed its laws, and as generous, the prizes suitable to the victors. And this
is yet more Divine, since as good, He devotedly entered the lists with them, contending,
on behalf of their freedom and victory, for their power over death and
destruction, he who is being initiated will enter the contests, as those
of God, rejoicing, and abides by the regulations of the Wise, and contends according
to them, without transgression holding
86 fast the hope of the beautiful rewards,
as being enrolled under a good Lord and Leader of the awards: and when after following
in the Divine footsteps of the first of athletes, through goodness, he has overthrown,
in his struggles after the Divine example, the energies and impulses opposed to
his deification, he dies with Christ—to speak mystically —to sin, in Baptism.

Section VII.

And consider attentively, I pray, with what appropriateness the holy symbols
are presented. For since death is with us not an annihilation of being, as others
surmise, but the separating of things united, leading to that which is invisible
to us, the soul indeed becoming invisible through deprivation of the body, and the
body, through being buried in earth in consequence of one of its bodily changes,
becoming invisible to human ken, appropriately, the whole covering by water would
be taken as an image of death, and the invisible tomb. The symbolical teaching,
then, reveals in mystery that the man baptized according to religious rites, imitates,
so far as Divine imitation is attainable to men, by the three immersions in the
water, the supremely Divine death of the Life-giving Jesus, Who spent three days
and three nights in the tomb, in Whom, according to the mystical and secret teaching
of the sacred text, the Prince of the world found nothing.
87

Section VIII.

Next, they throw garments, white as light, over the man initiated. For by his
manly and Godlike insensibility to contrary passions, and by his persistent inclination
towards the One, the unadorned is adorned, and the shapeless takes shape, being
made brilliant by his luminous life.

But the perfecting unction of the Muron makes the man initiated of good odour,
for the holy perfecting of the Divine birth unites those who have been perfected
to the supremely Divine Spirit. Now the overshadowing which makes intelligibly of
a good savour, and perfect, as being most unutterable, I leave to the mental consciousness
of those who are deemed worthy of the sacred and deifying participation of the Holy
Spirit within their mind.

At the conclusion of all, the Hierarch calls the man initiated to the most Holy
Eucharist, and imparts to him the communion of the perfecting mysteries.